Sjeng : notes for chess servers

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The following is a collection of notes. If you intend to run Sjeng on a chess server I advise you to read them carefully.

First, to run Sjeng on a chess server you need WinBoard or XBoard with zippy support compiled in. Please read the file zippy.README included with the XBoard/WinBoard distribution carefully, as it contains many essential hints in getting Sjeng to work.

Using a computer program to play for you isn't allowed on any server without a special computer account.
Please mention in your notes what hardware and software (in this case Sjeng) you are using.
Some chess servers will not allow your program to receive crazyhouse challenges by default. For FICS, you will need to set "f2" to "crazyhouse" only, or else no-one will be able to challenge you. Similar settings are needed for other variants.
The current FICS version has a bug which causes resuming a crazyhouse challenge to be displayed as a blitz challenge to the chess program. You will need to add "normal" to the zippyVariants variable and block normal chess challenges with your formula if you don't want Sjeng to play standard chess.
The chess.net server has bugs which cause WinBoard/XBoard to be unable to indentify the chess variant. If you use Sjeng to play crazyhouse or bughouse there is a chance that it will lock up at the first dropmove. There is nothing I can do about this, but you might want to try the crazyhouse-only version of Sjeng which is available on the download page.
ICC allows for 'reconnecting' to a game in case of a disconnect. WinBoard however is not able to detect that the game is a variant, and will not be able to inform Sjeng of this fact, causing it to refuse moves. Always let the opponent adjourn and resume if a disconnection during a variant game happens.